-
A surprisingly long collection of online tools/services for note-taking.
-
Neeeeat! (thanks, tbit.nu)
-
Widely recognizable synthesizer sounds that you've heard over and over.
-
a collection of tips and links from Google
-
stroll down memory lane with this jumbo list of links to videos hosted on YouTube
-
hook up a second monitor to your PC
-
downloadable two page PDF lists all Google services and tools as well as background information
-
all of Google's tools and services, accessible from one page
-
"There's no smart pill to ward off that age-related decline, but experts increasingly say that lifestyle factors such as physical activity, challenging hobbies and lots of friends or social engagements might help keep the brain more nimble and fit"
-
split up as a collection of 27 PDFs for download
-
"Nintendo has sold nearly five million copies of its three Nintendo DS brain training games since the series launched in Japan a year ago."
-
"We need to listen to the expert warnings about the potential impact of digital communication on how people think and learn"
-
"Tens of millions of people are suffering fatigue-filled days and wakeful nights as television, the Internet and other distractions contribute to an escalating epidemic of sleeplessness in America, according to a major new government study."
-
"Watch out for people who have a situational value system, who can turn the charm on and off depending on the status of the person they are interacting with... Be especially wary of those who are rude to people perceived to be in subordinate roles."
-
I still use the "Bunny Ears" techique...
-
a collection of quotes from '43 Folders'
-
"This is a free program (apparently made in Russia?) that will allow you to actually use your Epson ink cartridges until they truly run out, vs when the digital management chip on it stops you and forces a replacement."
-
"Ono had first done the performance in 1964, in Japan, and again at Carnegie Hall, in New York, in 1965. Ono sat motionless on the stage after inviting the audience to come up and cut away her clothing, covering her breasts at the moment of unbosoming."
-
"The Sex Pistols (Glen Matlock Version) do 'Anarchy in The UK' on September 4th 1976 on the Granada TV show 'So It Goes'."
-
"...last but not least, don't be a wimp. You have to be hardcore. You want that all-nighter. You need that all-nighter. You will get that all-nighter, and then you will tear a phonebook apart with your teeth..."
-
links to various resources; many are free
-
Bill Gates talks about the tools he uses to work productively; check the popup photo gallery for tips from other high-flyers
-
things to avoid when pursuing any vocation (e.g. "Constantly compare yourself to other artists.")
-
the French-language New Wave hit by Belgian artist Plastic Bertrand, demystified for you (thanx, waydownhere.net)
-
Flash-powered DIY comic strip generator
-
poor kitty is *not* enjoying her time in the tub...
-
web-surfing diversions for office-monkeys, courtesy of 'Businessweek'
-
"The Simpsons, an animated series, has used and coined many neologisms for humorous effect. The most famous example is Homer Simpson's signature annoyed grunt, "D'oh!" which has been listed in the Oxford English Dictionary"
-
"People long for big thrills. Peak experiences. Some people come to Zen expecting that Enlightenment will be the Ultimate Peak Experience. The Mother of All Peak Experiences. But real enlightenment is the most ordinary of the ordinary."
-
"Why? Because I said so!" and other conventions for explanations
-
"When (columnist) Jan Wong took a job as a maid to find out what it's like to live as a low-income Canadian, she worried that Globe readers would recognize her... she rarely saw her clients. But she learned surprisingly intimate things about them"
-
"This is an obituary for the generation gap. It is a story about 40-year-old men and women who look, talk, act, and dress like people who are 22 years old. It's not about a fad but about a phenomenon that looks to be permanent."
-
Kottke: "If a mutual fund company runs three funds, two of which do well, one of which does poorly, they will simply dissolve the underperforming fund... They now appear to have a purely successful record, with all their (current) funds performing well."
-
"People who have to smile all the time in their jobs are more likely to fall ill than others, according to a study."
-
many of these have already been mentioned on other "best freeware" lists, but there are a couple new ones here
-
funny movies, pictures, sound files, etc. , all about working life -- the sort of the stuff that emailed/forwarded ad nauseam to offices everywhere
-
"Studies link naps to increased alertness, accuracy, and productivity, according to Zorba Paster, M.D., author of 'The Longevity Code'." (via geekent.com)
-
"No. 9: Eyeglasses"
-
"Four employees, sick of slave wage labour and an ungrateful boss, up and left. Walked out, en masse, in the ultimate act of defiance against corporate middle management."
-
"A severed finger can survive for at least 12 hours in a warm environment and up to a couple of days if refrigerated. Some reports indicate that body parts can survive for as many as four days before being reattached."
-
Underworld, The Buzzcocks, New Order, and others talk about the inspirations behind some well-known hits (thanks, waydownhere.net)
-
"...humans, unlike primates, 'can get stressed simply with thought, turning on the same stress response as does the zebra.' And when that stress response is turned on chronically, 'We get sick.'" (thanks, tbit.nu)
-
playing copy-protected music on your portable music device will drain the battery faster (because of the extra processing power needed to decrypt the files) than playing regular MP3s
-
which one would you trust more?
-
reading this should help you sleep better at night ;)
-
get your money's worth from that trip to the salad bar
-
part one of a two-part series on lifestyle and brain fitness
-
part two of a two-part series on lifestyle and brain fitness
-
nobody wants to hear your singing at the office -- really (Flash, 404kb)
-
archival CBC audio and video from 1977; includes an interview with Iggy Pop
-
people who use phrases like "PIN number" deserve to be smacked upside the head
-
passwords, Social Security Numbers, and more... oops
-
"3. Learn to friggin' spell"
-
"10. You will forget all this."
-
simple batch scripting to launch all your commonly-used Windows applications in one shot
-
"A Dutch study suggests complex decisions like buying a car can be better made when the unconscious mind is left to churn through the options. This is because people can only focus on a limited amount of information"
-
"The best business solution is not always the best technology solution. The burden is on you, the technologist, to make the best system the business will use."
-
all those cool Firefox extensions that make the browser so addictive to use can also make it run verrrrry sloooow; here are some things to try to help speed it up again
-
find 'Calvin and Hobbes' cartoons that contain a particular phrase or keyword; we need one of these for 'Dilbert'
-
"Lists of the 2500 most acclaimed albums and songs of all time compiled from critics' best-of lists all around the world."
-
top 10 lists of Muppets, Madonna singles, and more...
-
some MP3s from T-dot dance-punk band Controller.Controller
-
"interesting" visual representations of well-known Hollywood films
-
I would need an entire battery of these, I think...
-
"You drink a cup of coffee and immediately take a 15 minute nap."
-
"People in our study were convinced they've accurately understood the tone of an e-mail message when in fact their odds are no better than chance"
-
"It's easier than ever to earn money blogging. But it's not a recipe for quitting your day job, says the author of a new book on keyword advertising."
-
big list of links
-
"Put your USB drive to work as a portable desktop, PC recovery kit, entertainment platform, and more."
-
explains "what the difference is between England, Great Britain, the British Isles and the United Kingdom"; heck, I just like Venn diagrams
-
"a general relationship between meeting load and the employee's level of fatigue and subjective workload was found"
-
"1. Don't watch TV or even so much as look at a computer screen at least 30 minutes before you lie down."
-
Eeeeeeek!
-
"A team has shown that people are as woozy when they wake as they are after drinking several beers."
-
coming in at #3: "World's first biogas train fueled by cows"
-
a weekly podcast from the people who brought you 'The Office' (original BBC version)
-
I've heard of maybe half of these; got two (LCD Soundsystem and M.I.A.)
-
At least I've heard of most of these albums; I only have one of them (M.I.A.'s 'Arular')
-
An exhaustive set of lists, including top albums, top singles, worst albums, artist picks, and more.
-
All pandas. All the time.
-
"Coffee improves short-term memory and speeds up reaction times by acting on the brain's prefrontal cortex, according to a new study."
-
"awareness, or "visual working memory," depends on your ability to filter out irrelevant information"
-
"Why we sometimes wake up a minute before the alarm rings."
-
free program for PC which will print out paper models of proteins for you to cut and fold
-
"Soothe a burn, cure a toothache, clear a stuffed nose..."
-
freeware, shareware, and playable demos for old-school gaming
-
"We actually found that sugar snacks, not artificially sweetened snacks, are better self-medications for the two most common types of stress -- psychological and physical"
-
get your own Fender Stratocaster electric guitar with Hello Kitty on it (a Badtz Maru bass is also available)
-
TIME Canada article on the 'JACK-FM' radio format
-
search tips and pointers to places that link to or provide free music online
-
if you've spent any time keeping up with the MP3 blogs, most of these names will be familiar; there are a couple surprises (Kelly Clarkson?!)
-
book by 'Dilbert' cartoonist Scott Adams, now available as a free PDF download
-
DIY signage fun
-
why the record companies want Apple to vary the prices it charges for tracks in iTunes
-
I am both repelled and intrigued
-
there've been a few other lists like this; this is a recent one from Pitchfork Media
-
it's "a personal aircraft that can hover or fly at 55 knots"
-
tiny ultralight airplanes
-
"listening to soft music at bedtime will help older adults sleep better and longer"
-
"Aspergillus fumigatus, the species most commonly found in the pillows, is most likely to cause disease; and the resulting condition Aspergillosis has become the leading infectious cause of death in leukaemia and bone marrow transplant patients."
-
overview of 19 different social bookmarking services (such as del.icio.us, Spurl, Furl, Jots, etc.)
-
recipes for cooking meals in one pot; fewer dishes to wash is always a good thing
-
feature-finder for various blogging software
-
type international characters and other symbols using the ALT key and various numbers
-
a blog about caffeine
-
"most animal species need to sleep, suggesting that human slumber has an evolutionary history reaching back over half a billion years"
-
"Employees at IT company Nutzwerk Ltd, in Leipzig, have to agree to be in a good mood as part of their employment contract." Brrrrrrr....
-
"'We found a large a variance - larger than we anticipated - in the caffeine content in each of the espressos,' he said. 'The range was 25 milligrams to 214 milligrams, which was far greater than we'd anticipated.'"
-
15 minute podcast; part 2 of 2
-
several articles looking at communicating from the angles of technology, science , commerce, culture, and more
-
"Recent studies have found that drinking coffee can actually be a healthy habit, enhancing athletic performance, increasing mental alertness and protecting against serious diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and even liver and colon cancers."
-
"One hour of increased brain activity via thinking a lot or experiencing new stimuli can make you smarter, more energetic, more creative, and more sociable. Here are some of the endless numbers of activities that can stimulate your brain."
-
"Your brain is a time machine with three modes that control everything from instantaneous tasks like moving to maintaining long trains of thought and ultimately staying in synch with night and day."
-
"Your brain never stops working. But it does cease talking to itself when you lose consciousness"
-
14 minute podcast; part 1 of 2
-
neat Flash app that shows the passage of time
-
Flash clock with hand-drawn numbers
-
Several articles about sleep from the journal 'Nature'
-
set up a two-alarm system...
-
letter and email writing both follow "a 'bursty' pattern -- most emails are answered fairly quickly, but a few sit around for a long time, and some sit around for a very long time"
-
zoom in (and out again) or pick another viewpoint -- very neat
-
collection of links to various blogging tips
-
go to bed whenever you want (i.e. when you're sleepy) but always get up at the same time every day
-
work for ten minutes, break for two; do this five times to fill an hour's worth of working and breaking
-
"quick sampling of Ask Metafilter threads on productivity, procrastination, and just getting it together"
-
feeling blocked?
-
gotta whip The Hovel into shape
-
"Web sites instruct fans on how to beat copy-protected CDs"
-
Good free CD-ripping software (mentioned in above article)
-
oh, my...
-
"This epidemic of long hours at the office -- whether physically or remotely -- defies historical precedent and common sense..." (thanks to Jimcat for the link)
-
"Glazing - Corporate-speak for sleeping with your eyes open; a popular pastime at conferences and early-morning meetings."
-
background sounds to play when you need an excuse to hang up the phone
-
from Ask MetaFilter: "Where can I find quality MP3s (or other) of nature sounds, running water, birds, etc, that I can listen to at my desk?"
-
"63 tracks, containing sine waves at various frequencies"; free download; burn to your own disc
-
"Here's why floating things tend to clump together"
-
ergonomic tips
-
"These strategies are common to the thinking styles of creative geniuses in science, art, and industry throughout history."
-
"Cursing... is a human universal. Every language, dialect or patois ever studied, living or dead, spoken by millions or by a small tribe, turns out to have its share of forbidden speech..."
-
you too can appear to be hard at work all the time
-
"Instead of fighting the real war that was thrust upon us on that incomprehensible morning four years ago, we stubbornly insisted on fighting a war of the imagination..."
-
"Your man is no good. He treats you like crap, lies to you, abuses you, bullies you, exploits you, takes your money..."
-
"'(T)he authorities' are too few and too centralized to respond to the dispersed and numerous emergencies of a disaster. Instead, the people classified as victims generally do what can be done to save themselves and one another."
-
"People reach their peak of alertness between 6pm and 7pm"
-
"A survey by the National Sleep Foundation (NSF) found that 33% of adults said they would nap at work if they were allowed."
-
"We try and we try and we try and we try, but we can't get no satisfaction. And that's okay, because humans weren't meant to be happy"
-
"The 25 most contented societies, as judged by the latest World Values Survey"
-
"How the once-speed-addicted Carl Honore became the guru of the slow movement"
-
Excerpt from "In Praise of Slow: How a Worldwide Movement is Challenging the Cult of Speed"
-
themes from 'The Jeffersons', 'Laverne and Shirley', 'The Muppet Show', and more...
-
"(Researchers) watched how capuchin monkeys reacted to mirrors, or to familiar or unfamiliar monkeys... In what could be seen as proto-human reactions, male monkeys are competitive whereas females flirt with their reflections."
-
interview with sound-sampling pioneer Steve Stein
-
McNeil, author of 'Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk', is interviewed by 'Gothamist'
-
type in some text and get your own 'X&Y'-style graphic
-
William Gibson on the Beat authors' "cut-up method" of writing
-
an essay by Neil Gaiman
-
a weekly hand-drawn visual array of news headlines
-
old pics of current stars, many of whom sport "80s hair"
-
"The Spidron is a planar figure consisting of two alternating sequences of isosceles triangles which, once it is folded along the edges, exhibits extraordinary spatial properties."
-
"The World's Healthiest Foods has an excellent list of healthy foods which need less than 30 minutes of preparation and cooking times."
-
fun with your phone number and a calculator
-
a freaky word-association meme
-
somewhat long video (Quicktime) offers tongue-in-cheek advice on putting together the perfect creative working environment
-
amen to "American Pie" coming in at #1
-
links to an assortment of video about or featuring robots, courtesy of MetaFilter
-
paintings, drawings, animation, and textures from a guy who works at Pixar
-
"writing toys, games & gizmoz to inspire your creativity!"
-
courtesy of the American Film Institute
-
Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore writes about cassette culture
-
a bunch of links about cover songs
-
made using a large fan and some other hardware, for less than $30 CAD